KING POWER!

Epiphone has finally unveiled its new version of BB King’s hallowed Lucille - after Epiphone artist Emily Wolfe premiered the guitar on Instagram back in February.

Now, as you might know, BB actually owned a number of ebony Gibsons including ES-335S, ES-355S and Blueshawk, and he gave the name Lucille to every one of his main guitars after 1949. However, this model is based on the most common: a Gibson ES-335. Unlike regular 335s though, BB favoured his tops without F-holes, which arguably helps to cut down on feedback. So, what we have here is a five-ply, maple-bodied semi-acoustic. Running through the centre of the body is a maple centre block, and the neck is also cut from maple too. The rosewood fingerboard is 22 fret, with the classic Gibson 24.75” scale length, and as well as the gold hardware (including Grover Rotomatic tuners and an Epiphone Locktone Tune-o-matic bridge with fine-tuners), the Lucille’s Gloss Black finish, block inlays, double-bound body and bound headstock and scratchplate certainly give this guitar an air of class.

It’s not all about the looks, though, as there are some interesting things going on electronically, too. The pickups are Alnico Pro humbuckers, controlled by the usual two-volume/two-tone/three-way switch we’d expect. But Epiphone has also hooked up a six-position Varitone switch as-per BB’S. This rotary control brings some preset filters into the mix, like having a stepped tone control that you can recall at the flick of a switch. Finally, the Lucille has regular mono and stereo outputs in case you want to run it into two amps, just like BB did. It’s available now priced at £799. Keep an eye out for a full review next month!